1. Field of the Technology
The present technology relates to a developer collecting apparatus installed in an image forming apparatus such as an electrophotographic image forming apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, a shift from monochrome image forming apparatuses to full-color image forming apparatuses has become common and, as the development of image forming apparatuses has advanced, color image forming apparatuses have come to be widely used. For electrophotographic image forming apparatuses of color image forming apparatuses, in order to respond to reduction in size of the apparatuses and increase in speed of color image formation, an indirect transfer method of using an intermediate transfer body has been much proposed. In this method, image data separated by color component are stacked from electrostatic latent image carriers (may be referred to as photoreceptors hereafter) of a plurality of image forming units (may be referred to as process printing units) onto the intermediate transfer body to form developer images (primary transfer), and the developer images transferred in the primary transfer are transferred together onto a conveyed recording sheet that is a transfer-subjected medium (secondary transfer) to form a color image on the recording sheet.
In common, it is well known that in a transfer process in image formation, at the time of the primary transfer from the photo receptors to the intermediate transfer body, 100% of developer that forms the developer images on the photoreceptors is not transferred to the intermediate transfer body, but the developer remains a little on the photoreceptors. The transfer efficiency is considered approximately 90% in general. Also in the secondary transfer process of transferring the developer images formed on the intermediate transfer body onto the recording sheet, residual developer is produced in the same manner as described above.
Accordingly, in normal, an image forming apparatus is provide with a cleaning apparatus for collecting the residual developer remaining on the photoreceptors and the intermediate transfer body in the primary and secondary transfer processes, and a developer collecting container for collecting the residual developer eliminated as waste developer by the cleaning apparatus (for example, refer to Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication JP-A 2000-352852). However, in the case of installing a plurality of developer collecting containers for a plurality of image forming units and an intermediate transfer body, a tie-in space in the apparatus needs to be large, which is undesirable in that compact design is hard, user operability decreases and the waste developer contaminates the inside of the apparatus.
Considering the above points, the applicant already proposed, in Japanese Patent Application No. 2004-335499, an integrated developer collecting container that stores waste developer produced from a plurality of production sources of the residual developer to seek solution of the above problems.
However, the above proposal discloses a technique for realizing integration of the containers and solving the problems on compact design and so on, but does not disclose how to realize movement and hold of the waste developer collecting container into at least three operating positions in which the container should be positioned when the container is installed in an image forming apparatus. The three operating positions are: a position in which the container is installed in the image forming apparatus and the apparatus is in operation; a removal position for replacing the waste developer container; and a position to carry out maintenance of the image forming apparatus.